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Christmas in Ho Chi Minh was turning out to be a very good time, we spent the days walking around the city, visiting places, wishing people happy Christmas and eating. Lunchtime became a regular visit to the Banh Mi shop round the corner from our hotel near to the Ben Thanh market. The Banh Mi were French bread rolls filled with crispy pork belly, pickled vegetables and chillies. These went down a treat, washed down by freshly squeezed orange juice […]

Been hit with the double header of Wimbledon finals week and the first week of the 100th Tour de France, hence the lack of posts recently. We had started planning to follow this year’s TdF around France with a camper van, but work got in the way so we prevaricated, and then went to Vietnam (so not a bad decision in any sense). It would be good to do it though, there’s some interesting people following it and no doubt […]

Tak Bat, the ancient alms giving ceremony is one of the highlights of visiting Luang Prabang. Monks walk down the streets from 05:30 every morning and receive alms of rice and other food from those wishing to gain some kind of spiritual redemption. Monks in orange garbs walking silently in single file, whilst lines of crouching or kneeling people place little bundles of sticky rice into the bowls hanging from the monks shoulders…..is how it’s described in the tourist guides. […]

The night market down Luang Prabang’s main street is a good place to take a wander and search out some bargains to take home as presents. Stalls are jammed in side by side, and four deep across the street. Packed full of tee shirts (so that’s where everybody gets the Lao Beer tee shirts from), scarves, silks, pottery, puppets, trinkets, jewellery, lamp shades, machetes and those little fluorescent spinny things that you fire up into the air with an elastic […]

Lane Xang, home of a million elephants, Lao Peoples Democratic Republic- Laos. We entered Laos via the friendship bridge across the mighty Mekong river from Nong Khai in Thailand. We didn’t know that much about the place, except that everybody who had been there who we spoke to loved the people and the place. I don’t remember ever hearing a bad word spoken about the place. So with much excitement we booked a couple of nights in Vientiane the nations […]

We spent a few days in Nong Khai in the north of Thailand before crossing into Laos. Didn’t really know what to expect of the place, which is usually a good thing. We arrived early in the morning after taking the overnight train from Bangkok, checked into our slightly odd accommodation and went for a tiki tour around. I say odd, but many people like it. For me it’s too “knowing”, too easy, too “Thai- lite”, and too many mosquitos, […]

Patpong, a minutes walk from the Sala Daeng Skytrain station, and an eye watering way to spend a couple of hours in the evening. Patpong is the oldest red light area in Bangkok and more of a tourist “experience” than it’s close neighbours in Soi Cowboy and Nana Plaza. It’s pretty difficult to walk around, between the night market selling the “hello kitty” paraphernalia, next to vibrators, dildos and porno DVDs, and then the go go bars and their […]